Center for Security Policy

The Center for Security Policy is a Washington-based organisation set up by the hardline neoconservativeFrank Gaffney, who worked in the defence department during the Ronald Reagan era. According to journalist Jim Lobe, it is a "a small think tank funded mainly by U.S. defence contractors, far-right foundations, and right-wing Zionists".[1] It operates with the tagline 'promoting peace through strength', by which they appear to mean that global US dominance is the route to peace.

The Center states its mission as follows:

To identify challenges and opportunities likely to affect American security, broadly defined, and to act promptly and creatively to ensure that they are the subject of focused national examination and effective action.[2]

The Center has run campaigns and research on the subjects of nuclear deterrents, the war of ideas, weapons in space, Islamism and terror, among others.[3] Indeed Frank J. Gaffney Jnr describes his Center for Security Policy as "the special forces in the war of ideas"[4], stating that it has the advantage over a think tank of not being "slow and unwieldy" and being "able to turn around a product in a matter of hours".[5]

In recent years the Center has been at the forefront of a push to raise questions about the role of Muslims in the USA, and the idea that the Obama administration has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood, and that President Obama himself is a 'secret Muslim'. It has set up initiatives such as the Coalition to Stop Shariah, part of its high-profile Shariah Risk Due Diligence project.

History

1976-1988

Important in itself, the Committee on the Present Danger’s (CPD) second incarnation in the 1970s and early 1980s was an extremely important predecessor to the Center for Security Policy. Set up as an independent and not-for-profit organisation, it was to assess the Soviet Union’s capabilities and threat to the United States in a non-partisan way. The group was originally called ‘Team B’ in opposition to the ‘Team A’ which did this job for the CIA, and had a political base through the Coalition for a Democratic Majority which was founded to try and fight back against any concessions made by the Democrats to the Soviet Union with regards to Foreign Policy. In 1976, this group helped set up the Committee for Present Danger to put pressure on Democrat President Jimmy Carter. The parallels with groups such as the Center for Security Policy can be shown by looking at who have been members of both – Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, and even Ronald Reagan in 1979.

1988-1992

In 1987, Frank Gaffney broke with the Reagan administration over its decision to pursue treaties that aimed for nuclear arms reduction in cooperation with the Soviet Union. Gaffney argued against this policy and continued to push for a hard-line, anti-Soviet rhetoric and the continued buildup of nuclear weapons. The following year he founded the Center for Security Policy, basing it loosely on the Committee on the Present Danger, which had taken up the same aggressive opposition to nuclear arms reduction. Gaffney and his colleagues were quick to criticise the Republican President for moving towards liberal governance and preferred to push claims about the level of threat posed to the United States by the Red Menace and the need to possess a much larger nuclear arsenal than that of their rival.

1992-2000

During the Carter and Clinton administrations, the group who formed the basis for the Center for Security Policy, the neoconservatives, found themselves in opposition to a Democratic administration with different foreign policy aims and methodologies. Along with the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), the CSP became the main bedrock of shadow defence policy during the 1990s,[6] a time when the group helped to bring the militarisation of space from the realm of science fiction to almost reality. One of their elaborate claims throughout the 1990s resulted in support for the newly created Project for a New American Century, in which a letter was signed by several prominent CSP members, among others, and sent to President Clinton to urge him to attack Iraq due to the “scourge of Saddam and the weapons of mass destruction that he refuses to relinquish.” [7] Gaffney was also proud of his group’s involvement in both the Rumsfeld Missile Commission and the Rumsfeld Space Commission which both suggested that the United States was under far more of a threat than previously suggested and, of course, than it realistically was. Gaffney has been known to describe his baby, the CSP, as the “Dominos Pizza of the policy business”[8] due to its speed at being responding to any situation with a demand and suggestion for policy, usually of a hard-line, neoconservative nature.

2000-present

When George W. Bush, himself a hard-line neoconservative, was elected in the year 2000, members of the Center for Security Policy gained important positions in the administration. Frank Gaffney, Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and John Bolton are all names that have become synonymous with the neoconservative agenda and aggressive "War on Terror" foreign policy that has been a feature of the world in the past 8 years, providing much work and profit to companies such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin. The events of September 11, 2001 gave the Center for Security Policy a new impetus to push both its war of ideas and its idea of “America the vulnerable”, building on its "educational video" of 1998 with the same name,[9] and through Gaffney and the CSP’s network of members throughout the administration. Indeed, when Donald Rumsfeld addressed the ‘Keeper of the Flame’ banquet in November 2001 he said of Gaffney, "If there was any doubt about the power of your ideas, one only has to look at the number of Center associates who people this administration — and particularly the Department of Defense — to dispel them."[10] He made this statement in front of a banner proclaiming CSP’s ominous motto of “Peace Through Strength”, suggesting that the CSP was influential in the early stages of the supposed “War on Terror”.

Center for Security Policy Board of Directors

Chairman of the Board

Directors

M.D.B. Carlisle Former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Legislative Affairs, and former Chief of Staff to Senator Thad Cochran

Terry Elkes Principal & Co-Owner, Apollo Partners, LLC. He manages and co-owns Apollo Partners, LLC, a private equity firm engaged in acquiring media, communications, entertainment, and broadcasting companies. Elkes' experience in media acquisition dates back to his work as president and CEO of Viacom in the 1970s and 1980s.[14]

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. President, Center for Security Policy. He formerly acted as the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy during the Reagan Administration, following four years of service as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear Forces and Arms Control Policy.[16]

James T. deGraffenreid is a former CSP chairman, and he remains on the board. He was a principal in two major defense-related industries: HP Associates (formerly Phillips Publishing), which is a "key information supplier to the Defense, Aviation, Telecommunication, and Energy Industries"; and First Service Networks (formerly Sure Air Corp)."[17]

Military Committee

In 1999, the CSP created the military committee filled with former high ranking officers in order to create links with the armed forces. the aim of this committee was to "put U.S. national security once again on sound footing — not only in the war against terrorism but in the defense transformation that is so desperately needed."[23]

The current chairman, Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely, is a past deputy commander of all U.S. Army forces in the Pacific. According to CSP, "General Vallely is working with other members of the Committee — many of whom are among the foremost national security practitioners and thinkers of our time — to engage the military community, and those attentive to its views, as catalysts for renewing America's defense capabilities and adopting effective peace-through-strength policies to guide their use."[24]

Academic Council

The Academic Council is comprised of 18 professors who adhere to the CSP's mandate of "peace through strength" and strive to pass on this philosophy to students across the country. Although there is large scale hostility and resistance amongst professors to the governments leadership, CSP realises the importance of educating and training the next generation and mobilises its academic council as its voice in the academic realm. The stated goals of the council are as follows:

Help in the education and development of the next generation of robust academics and policy practitioners in the defense, national security, international affairs, intelligence and related fields.

Serve as a networking vehicle among established and emerging scholars, their students, prospective students and the policy community

Promote the intellectual work of its members, their colleagues and students, and to ensure them the greatest possible exposure.[25]

Board of Regents

The CSP created a board of regents in 2003 to promote and establish support for the center. The chairman of the board, Miles Prentice, along with other members, strives to bring the Center's work to the forefront of the minds of new audiences and generate funding for ongoing research. In order to create interest in the Center, the board of regents establishes links with business and community leaders. The Center states: "Such interactions occur at the monthly Regents Breakfast Series held at New York’s St. Regis Hotel. In addition, the Board sponsors each year two major events in New York: the Regents Annual Dinner held in June and the Mightier Pen Award luncheon held in the late Fall."[26]

The board of regents has become an integral part of the success of CSP and in 2005 the Regents council was formed to aid and add strength to the board. The council consists of young professionals who work closely with the board.

Prominent members

Frank Gaffney

Gaffney served as an aide to the late Senator Henry M. “Scoop” Jackson in the areas of defence and foreign policy for a short period and in consequent years held the position of Secretary of Defence for Nuclear Forces and Arms Control Policy under the surveillance of the Assistant of Security, Richard Perle. It was in April 1987 when Gaffney became part of the Reagan administration where he was nominated to become the Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Policy; the senior position within the Defense Department with a key responsibility for policies such as nuclear forces, arms control and U.S.-European defence relations. Gaffney also served as the Chairman of the prestigious High Level Group, NATO's senior politico-military committee.[27] It was after this period in which Gaffney became Founder and President of the Center for Security and Policy, established in 1988.

Out-with Gaffney’s well-connected political realm, he is also an established name within literature, academia and the media. He is the author of War Footing: Ten Steps America Must Take to Prevail in the War for the Free World[28] and he has published articles in: The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, The New Republic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Christian Science Monitor, The Los Angeles Times, National Review, Newsday, American Legion Magazine, and Commentary Magazine. Gaffney is cited in the press as an expert on U.S foreign policy whilst (according to author and civil rights litigator Glenn Greenwald in an article for Salon.com) flouting his often extremist views.[29]. Greenwald describes Gaffney as

beating [his] chest and issuing calls for vastly escalated slaughter in the form of sloganeering such as "the U.S. needs to start doing what needs to be done in the Middle East", but when challenged about these views or called upon to say explicitly what they mean, [he] very frequently lacks the courage of [his] convictions, fearfully running away from the clear meaning of what [he] said.[30]

Profits of a Non-Profit

According to a report in The Tennessean, Frank Gaffney earned a $288,300 salary in 2008 from CSP, supposedly a non-profit charity.[32]

Richard Perle

Perle is a member of the Center for Security Policy's Board of Advisors. He was a former Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Policy during the period of 1981-87, and worked along-side Frank Gaffney. Perle has also served as Chairman of Defence Policy Board (2001-2003), is the Resident Fellow for the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research and is consequently "a leading authority on national security, military requirements, arms proliferation and defence, and regional conflicts." [33]

In addition, Perle has an abundance of publications (in the same newspapers that Gaffney writes for). These include: the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and the Jerulsalem Post. Perle was has written politically orientated works which include Hardline and An End to Evil: How to Win the War on Terror.[34] A review of the book An End to Evil by Gary Kamiya for Salon.com says that if the book's "recommendations are a little too extreme even for the George W.Bush-Dick Cheney-Paul Wolfowitz triumvirate, its underlying world-view is identical to theirs."[35]

Perle's profile on RightWeb states:

Perle's pessimism on Iraq stands in stark contrast to his trademark hard-nosed militarism, which has been a staple of his rhetoric for more than two decades. Reflecting core aspects of what many regard as the neoconservative worldview, Perle's discourse typically reflects a combination of warrior worship, existential conflict, and extreme moral righteousness.[36]

Despite his predilection for military intervention, Perle is unconventional in the sense that his support for the invasion of Iraq has wavered; not because now he disbelieves the claim that there were 'weapons of mass destruction' - he does not, but, he speculates about whether or not 'we' could have managed that threat by means other than a direct military intervention. His response? "Well, maybe we could have."[37]

membership of the Board of Advisers in the Foundation for the Defence of Democracies

an Adviser for the Jewish Institute for National Securtiy Affairs

his position on the Board of Trustees in the Hudson Institue

membership of the American Commitee for Peace in Chechnya

membership of the Committee on the Present Danger

the Chairman for the Council on Foreign Relations

Golden Circle supporter for the U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon.

Douglas Feith

Douglas Feith is the Former Chairman, a Founding Member and on the Board of Advisers for the Center for Security Policy. Feith is also the former U.S. Deputy Under-secretary of Defense for Policy (number three position). He did, however, resign from the Department of Defense, which "sparked widespread speculation among observers that he was pressured to leave because of a number of then-ongoing investigations related to the administration's efforts to bolster support for the Iraq War."[39]

Feith was one of the signatories to the 1998 letter "to President Bill Clinton calling for a 'comprehensive political and military strategy for bringing down Saddam and his regime' which was produced by the Project for the New American Century."[40] In addition, Feith is affiliated to a extensive range of groups. These include: membership of the Council on Foreign Relations; an Ex-Official Member of the U.S. Institute of Peace; the Assistant Secretary for the Foundation for Jewish Studies; a Letter Signatory for the Middle East Forum; a Study Participant for the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies; the Co-founder of One Jerusalem; a Missile Defense Study Team Leader for the National Institute for Public Policy and a Former Adviser for the Institute for National Security Affairs.

Donald Rumsfeld

Donald Rumsfeld is the former Secretary of Defense from 2001 (resigning in 2006). He is also a former Navy pilot, serving as the 13th Secretary of Defence, White House Chief of Staff, U.S. Ambassador to NATO, U.S. Congressman and Chief Executive Officer of two Fortune 500 companies. [41] Rumsfeld's experience extends further, ranging federal positions which allowed him to support neoconservative and hardline defence policies, with extensive membership from being a Member of the President's General Advisory Committee on Arms Control (1982-1986) to then his latter years including: the National Commission on Public Service; the National Economic Commission; the Board of Visitors of the National Defence University; the Commission on U.S./Japan Relations and also a member of the U.S. Trade Deficit Review Commission.[42]

It is unsurprising that Rumsfeld's range of experience is almost as impressive as his range of affiliations, as they prove just as extensive. They include links with the Intelligence Community, the Atlantic Institute and the Bilderberg Group. Significantly, Rumsfeld (like Douglas Feith) was "one of the signers of the January 26, 1998, Project for the New American Century (PNAC) letter sent to President William Jefferson Clinton".[43] Rumsfeld continues to be one of the Center for Security Policy's key financial supporters.

Paul Wolfowitz

Wolfowitz held the position of Defense Deputy Secretary under Rumsfeld and is also a member of the Rumsfeld Commission on the Ballistic Missile Threat. Wolfowitz was also a Founding Signatory for the Project for the New American Century. According to SourceWatch, Paul Wolfowitz "is best known to be one of the 'architects' of the war against Iraq."[44] Wolfowitz gained the position as chair of the U.S. State Department's International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) which is tasked with providing the State "with independent insight and advice on all aspects of arms control, disarmament, international security and related aspects of public diplomacy."[45] Fellow neocons from the National Institute for Public Policy and the Center for Security Policy served under Wolfowitz.[46]

Dick Cheney

Dick Cheney was the Vice President of the United States in the George W. Bush administration, supporting the invasion of Iraq (along with Rumsfeld) even before 9/11. In January 2006 he held the belief that "we've had a lot of good news out of Iraq over the course of the last year. It's hard sometimes to see through that, given the continued level of violence, obviously."[49] Cheney has similar views to Rumsfeld and his alliance with core neoconservatives like Paul Wolfowitz is also marked: Wolfowitz worked under Cheney when Wolfowitz was Defence Secretary during the George H.W. Bush administration. Together they oversaw the drafting of the notorious Defense Planning Guidance.[50]